Global oligopolists and a leading neo feudalism brand management guru have savaged the federal government’s visa changes, accusing them of being the leading edge in questioning a generations worth of Monopoly-Capitalist mantra which has paved the way to Australia’s economic malaise and suggesting that a nation with a higher foreign born population than any other in the OECD is labelling foreigners unfairly.

Coca-Cola Amatil managing director Alison Watkins, Woodside chief executive Peter Coleman and GE president Geoff Culbert described changes that will further restrict access to Australia’s visa system as hypocritical and retrograde. They also noted that all three ran businesses which focussed on minimising profits in Australia insofar as they related to taxation payments made here, were happiest when their employees in Australia were paid least, and found fresh migrants the the most committed to corporate values and behaviours while being most expendable without complaining about their minimum.

Former World Trade Organisation director Pascal Lamy lashed out at changes spurred by the global populist phenomenon.

“We have spent 35 years broadening the scope of global trade for the 1% who control more than half the world’s earnings just to extract ever more from the rest, and free trade and importing cheap labour from elsewhere has been our key leverage tool. Just because highly indebted former middle class types are upset about having their pay outcomes offshored or their services undermined by taxation avoiding multinationals, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t look at the upside. Australians shouldn’t underestimate how good this is…..’

Woodside chief executive Peter Coleman: ‘‘You put up barriers here and it will get reciprocated.” before adding “If we don’t take on board Indian and Chinese IT guys coughing back part of their incomes to people importing them, for the 457 visas they bring them out on, then it is highly likely that China and India will prevent Australians from delivering pizzas in China, or cease overpaying token Australian ex-politicians to sit on their boards. You never know where this sort of stuff ends.” Speaking at the Crawford Australian Leadership Forum in Canberra on Monday, he also concluded “As a part of the globalisation trend, labelling foreigners as a source of income and jobs has always been a good political trick in a nation which does nothing but export dirt, and bullshitting on about services and technology a convenient way to distract attention from all the extra pressure on infrastructure.”

In April, the Turnbull government announced it would abolish 457 visas and replace them with “temporary skill shortage visas” for fewer occupations on much stricter two-year and four-year timeframes.

The changes have meant that people in hundreds of jobs across the technology, business and hospitality sectors are no longer automatically eligible for permanent residency following on from their 457 visa.

The move has pushed many skilled workers to consider returning home because they do not see future opportunities in Australia. Australia is facing a potential shortage of dishwashers, aged care assistants, delivery drivers and hairdresser assistants unless more are trained locally in coming years.

Coca-Cola Amatil managing director Alison Watkins

A survey of more than 800 NSW businesses in May by the Business Chamber has revealed that nearly two thirds expect a shortage in the next twelve months if they are forced to hire full time staff or permanent people whom they have to train, and can’t pick and choose between desperadoes for whatever hours they have on offer who already have the requisite skills.

Woodside’s Peter Coleman said the wider community should be “very concerned by the changes”, adding “if things continue at this rate then the next step is looking at who pays tax, and we know some of them don’t too.”

Former WTO boss Pascal Lamy.

“We have a misconceived view that we are somehow losing jobs. The reality [is that] some jobs are too costly to develop here, and effectively we are only losing expensive, skilled, well trained and well remunerated jobs in globally competitive industries. There will always be plenty of jobs for those who want to be working poor in a nation that has no viable economic sectors apart from tourism and aged care.”

“This is a real retrograde step and one we should be very concerned about. It takes us back to the 1970s when employees had rights and companies paid taxes and people didn’t have to pay university fees and could afford houses. Do you really want to go there?”

Coca-Cola Amatil’s Alison Watkins described the move as purely political.

“We are a small country and we need to be able to attract the best skills; it’s absolutely hypocritical to suggest we need them for picking fruit, menial jobs like kitchen hands, delivery drivers, online customer service jobs and the like. We have far too many of almost every profession – apart from those affiliated with the AMA – and we are no longer sure Australia has the educational infrastructure to train anything other than embezzlement and tax avoidance 101.”

GE’s Geoff Culbert said there had been almost no consultation and it would now be hard to get “the genie back in the bottle, because people who weren’t not consulted when we initially decided on running a population Ponzi and have been ignored whenever they’ve asked questions about the increasing numbers of strangers and their role in higher house prices and lower wages, think the advent of migration running at 3 times the long term average may have something to do with it.”

“This is the problem with democracy because it’s policy driven by the next election, and politicians who fear for their turn at the political entitlements rort need to be sensitive to what is popularly palatable.”

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has repeatedly defended the policy.

“Where people are highly skilled, particularly if they are being employed in medical research institutes or tertiary hospitals, in many cases they won’t be affected by the changes that we’ve made,” Mr Dutton said in May.

He said the first of regular reviews of the skilled occupation list would be in July.

“We’ll continue to work with employers because there is an important place for some people to come in on that visa stream, but I want the default position to be Australian workers to fill those jobs.”

Despite the comments, large numbers of Australians still view the Minister as being somewhat creepy and quite likely to slip a little something into the mix, which they don’t like, at any given point, without providing them any knowledge of what he is doing. They also think he he wouldnt hesitate to outsource their jobs and leave them highly indebted if he thought he could achieve that.